Synopsis

Mal demands an explanation, but Jayne can't supply one -- all he did when he was here was steal some money from the magistrate. Jayne is, to put it mildly, freaking -- he's scared of what the magistrate will do if he catches Jayne back there. The magistrate is busy greeting Inara as she arrives; she makes a good impression, he makes a bad one. Back aboard Serenity, Book and River discuss faith when he catches her 'fixing' his Bible by correcting all inherent logistical flaws and contradictions. And the dirt-side crew heads for the nearest bar, where Jayne gets stared at by a local kid, and they make contact with their cargo; the middleman is, um, indisposed, but the merchandise is safe -- it just needs to be moved across town to the ship, without being seen. Discretion is the name of the game. But that gets a little trickier as the whole place gets treated to a rendition of "The Man They Called Jayne." Jayne finally realizes that the legend grew from him dumping several strongboxes of money over the planet during a screwed-up get-away; he was dumping weight to stay airborne and they made him a hero. Aboard Serenity River tries to return pages of Book's Bible to him, and runs screaming from his Albert Einstein-like hair. On the planet, Jayne tries to flee, but runs out of the bar into a gang of chanting hero-worshippers, alerted by the little boy. He retreats back inside to begin getting truly drunk, aided by rounds on the house in his honor. So much for discretion -- time for a new plan.

Inara's client turns out to be the magistrate's 27-year-son, Fess, who is a virgin; the magistrate is enough of a control freak (and a guy having conniptions about his son not being a "man") to want to hang around, but Inara kicks him out. The rest of Serenity's on-planet crew is over in the bar getting drunk; Jayne is enjoying the adulation, and Kaylee is enjoying the fact that Simon loosens up when he's drunk -- a lot. Mal decides to be a nice person and leaves them to it; he and Wash return to Serenity, where it's taking both Book and Zoe to draw River out of hair-induced hiding. Mal has talked the mudders into having a Jayne Day celebration in the town square the next day, which should provide a perfect cover for retrieving the cargo. Planetside, Inara seems to regard psychology as as much a part of her job as sex; she tries to talk some self-confidence into the kid before anything else. Then, she starts the everything else. And back at the bar, one of Jayne's young worshippers tells him how the magistrate had to let them keep the money Jayne dropped, and let them keep the statue up after they threatened riots. Jayne is deeply touched at the concept of riots for him; Magistrate Higgens is just massively pissed that Jayne has returned. He heads off to the sweatboxes that pass as prisons and free a particularly unprepossessing speciman named Stitch -- who is apparently the only person on planet who hates Jayne more than Higgens does, since Jayne pushed him out of the shuttle during their botched robbery partnership. Higgens hands him a gun and points him in Jayne's direction.

The morning after is not a pretty sight, hungover bodies sprawled everywhere. Kaylee, for example, is snuggled on top of Simon until Mal wakes them. Simon's 'ohmygod, it's her father' spinal reflex kicks in before he's actually awake and he disavows any and all possible events vehemently enough to really piss off Kaylee (Mal doesn't actually seem to care about any of it). As a result, he gets left behind in the bar when the others (including the hungover Jayne, who emerges with a groupie on his arm singing his own ballad) head off to get the cargo. It's morning after for Inara and Fess, too, but the afterglow is interrupted by Daddy banging on the door. Meanwhile, Jayne is starting to grow a conscience about using his 'followers' as a distraction; Mal sends him off to do his thing anyway, as he, Wash, Zoe and Kaylee head for the cargo. Fess gets dressed and tells Inara he has to go attend a criminal hearing for a newly-returned folk hero, and that his father has put a landlock on Serenity to keep her from lifting. Things elsewhere go mostly as planned -- the cargo is retrieved (from the mud where it was buried) and the rally is quite the distraction -- until Stitch shows up with a badly-beaten Simon (who he caught in the bar and decided to make responsible for Jayne's sins). Kaylee pulls Simon out of the line of fire as Stitch tells the entire crowd the real story of the dropped money -- how their transport was hit, and Jayne chose to shove his partner out before he shoved the money. Stitch raises his shotgun to shoot Jayne -- and the boy who was one of Jayne's first fans jumps in front of Jayne, taking the blast.

Jayne pulls a knife out of nowhere and throws it into Stitch's chest. A brief, ugly fight later, Stitch is dead -- but so is the kid. Jayne starts yelling, telling the people that he's no hero. But even after he knocks over his own statue, it's obvious they don't want to hear. The quartet retreat to Serenity and Mal tells Wash to lift off. He tries, and runs straight into the landlock the magistrate placed. But it mysteriously disappears as Inara comes into the cockpit; on the planet, the magistrate curses at his calm son, who had the landlock released. As Serenity gets the hell out of dodge, Simon tries to explain to Kaylee that he tries to act "appropriately" and "properly" towards her because it's the only way he has to show he respects her, and Mal tries to explain to Jayne why sometimes people need a hero more than they need the truth. Kaylee gets it. Jayne... doesn't.

Review

Relationships:
Simon and Kaylee seem to be drifting into a relationship, a little too slowly for Kaylee's taste, apparently.

Inara continues to fool absolutely no one about her feelings for Mal. Except maybe Mal.

Characters:
Poor Jayne. He will never, ever be my favorite person to hang out with, but I developed an odd kind of affection for him during this ep, particularly at the end. He's just... not really that smart, he doesn't have much imagination, and he doesn't have even an ounce of people sense -- and he is never, ever going to understand why that kid sacrificed himself for his hero. He feels sad about it, he feels guilty about it, and eventually, I think he's going to block it out and pretend it never happened, because that's the only way he's going to be able to deal with it. Mal is just never going to be able to explain about heroes and faith, and how little those two things have to do with reality, to someone who has no ability whatsoever to step outside of reality. No inkling of empathy to let him step out of his own shoes into someone else's. It limits him horribly outside his areas of competence.

Inara continues to rock, and it's very good that we didn't get to see her actually in action as a companion until we knew her well-enough to be able to deal with the reality of what she does for a living. And she does it well -- she handles Fess with kid gloves even as she kicks his dad's butt; I'm not sure how ethical it was to use her client to get her ship loose; I suspect she's been hanging around Mal for too long. But it was good for the kid in the long run, so we'll let it slide. And I continue to want her wardrobe with increasing desperation -- both the first gown and the morning after outfit were just far too cool for the room.

Simon is just a doll; it's sweet that he's trying to hold onto manners and respect -- the world would be a better place if more guys took their cue from him. :p [I'm (occasionally) a Texas girl, we appreciate manners.] The friction of his relationship with Jayne keeps him from being too perfect, thank god, and watching Jayne drive him to yelling (although not cursing!) irritation is quite fun. And, of course, he and Kaylee are far too cute. She so took advantage of him being drunk and all, but the snuggling was adorable (for the record, I'll lay serious money that some enthusiastic snuggling was about all that happened; he was pretty wasted). And, like every other poor schmuck who was raised right, he's got that instant reflex of deny everything when her father (or the equivalent authority figure) shows up. < snerk > He really is too easy to mess with, as Mal and Kaylee both proved. Takes half the fun out of it... But I love that Mal honestly couldn't care less about Kaylee's love life, and totally refused to get involved in the ensuing fight. < snicker >

And wow, River speaks! She speaks a lot. Super-intelligently. In polysyllables. And with great humor, made even funnier by the fact that she was taking the Bible that seriously. it makes you wonder how early the "Academy" got their hands on her, and what exactly they did to how her brain functions, to make the concept of faith and symbolism that alien to her. Still, it's good to see her bonding with and relating to people -- and running from quite scary hair. < snicker > And watching both Book and Zoe deal with her was a treat -- Zoe could someday be quite a good mother, and Book showed remarkable patience faced with the sundering of his Bible.

Best Moments:
Simon's "Son of a bitch!" was gorgeous -- perfectly set-up, perfectly delivered. I was rolling on the floor.

River and the Bible. Great scene, and a perfect first strong scene for River. Bet the fundies are frothing...

I flatly refuse to transcribe the lyrics of "The Man They Call Jayne." < snickering > I'd never be able to do it with a straight face. But everyone's reactions were priceless.

Inara kicking Magistrate Higgens out was way awesome. Loathsome little toad, and how happy are we that her standards are that high?

River and the Hair. Completely unable to stop laughing at any of it.

The wake-up scene. You may have noticed that I loved Simon and Kaylee waking up. Hilarity aside, aren't they just an adorable couple?

Wash's total inability throughout to keep from laughing about Jayne thing. I love Wash.

Inara finding out about Jayne the Hero. Fess was very cute in Daniel kind of way, and it was so amusing to see Inara speechless. Her delivery of "That would be bad," was one of the best deliveries ever of one of Joss's favorite lines.

Let's hear it for Simon fighting back! And not ratting Jayne out! Of course, he got his butt kicked, but Kaylee's "Oh, honey," as she forgets about being pissed and picks him up was very sweet. And pretty funny.

The last fight. Just when you think you're in a fluffy episode, the kid goes and gets himself killed. And it was interesting to watch the reactions of the three watching Jayne fight -- Kaylee flinches away, Simon watches open-mouthed open-mouthed, Mal just watches, totally expressionless.

Mal trying to explain it all to Jayne. Awesome performance from Adam Baldwin throughout the ep, but especially here.

Questions and Comments:
This was probably the strongest episode so far -- one main plot, three subplots, and all of them interwoven beautifully, the pacing tight and flowing. As Inara tries to soothe Fess into standing up for himself, Book tries to explain to River about faith, and the mudders' need to have faith in someone who will stand up for them makes Jayne a hero. All of the points are made without preaching or hitting anyone over the head, and you end up feeling sorry for an entire planet full of people who are going to wait forever for someone to come save them, even though there are enough of them that they can save themselves. Lovely.

Rating:
4 stars out of 5. Solid and involving, the funny balanced with the sucker-punch of serious angst at the end.